Mommy, Please Divorce Daddy

The seventh time Dante Moretti served me divorce papers, I was sitting with my son in a cheap diner on Chicago's South Side.

I forced a smile and brushed my hand over my son's hair. "Just wait a little longer, sweetheart. This time, Mommy will get custody of you."

He stayed quiet for a long moment.

Then he looked up and asked, “Mommy, how much do you need to sell me for before you're happy?”

Before I could answer, he pulled a handwritten divorce agreement from his backpack and pushed it toward me.

"I know you keep fighting Dad for me because you want more money from him."

"I wrote the agreement for him. Please sign it. Dad is already tired. Stop making his life so hard."

His handwriting was crooked, but every word had been written with care. Dante would give me three million dollars.

At the bottom, in my son's childish scrawl, was one more line.

[After you take the money, don't bother me, Dad, and Serena anymore. Let us be happy.]

Serena was Dante's childhood sweetheart.

The woman he trusted more than his own wife.

For five years, I had stood against Dante's family, his lawyers, and half the Chicago underworld just to keep custody of my son.

For him, I would've walked away with nothing.

But the child I had raised for eight years had already chosen another mother.

So why shouldn't I give their perfect little family exactly what they wanted?

The seventh time Dante Moretti served me divorce papers, I was sitting with my son in a cheap diner on Chicago's South Side.

I forced a smile and brushed my hand over my son's hair. "Just wait a little longer, sweetheart. This time, Mommy will get custody of you."

He stayed quiet for a long moment.

Then he looked up and asked, “Mommy, how much do you need to sell me for before you're happy?”

Before I could answer, he pulled a handwritten divorce agreement from his backpack and pushed it toward me.

"I know you keep fighting Dad for me because you want more money from him."

"I wrote the agreement for him. Please sign it. Dad is already tired. Stop making his life so hard."

His handwriting was crooked, but every word had been written with care. Dante would give me three million dollars.

At the bottom, in my son's childish scrawl, was one more line.

[After you take the money, don't bother me, Dad, and Serena anymore. Let us be happy.]

Serena was Dante's childhood sweetheart.

The woman he trusted more than his own wife.

For five years, I had stood against Dante's family, his lawyers, and half the Chicago underworld just to keep custody of my son.

For him, I would've walked away with nothing.

But the child I had raised for eight years had already chosen another mother.

So why shouldn't I give their perfect little family exactly what they wanted?

...

The seventh time Luca Bellandi served me